The Sesame Workshop Blog » Incarcerationhttp://www.sesameworkshop.org/our-blog
Wed, 01 Jul 2015 21:19:52 +0000en-UShourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.0‘There is Hope': An inmate’s account of the Sesame incarceration Initiativehttp://www.sesameworkshop.org/our-blog/2013/08/29/there-is-hope-an-inmates-account-of-the-sesame-incarceration-initiative/
http://www.sesameworkshop.org/our-blog/2013/08/29/there-is-hope-an-inmates-account-of-the-sesame-incarceration-initiative/#commentsThu, 29 Aug 2013 14:17:58 +0000http://www.sesameworkshop.org/our-blog/?p=2877Sesame Street’s newest community engagement initiative, Little Children, Big Challenges: Incarceration, was created to comfort and reassure children who have an incarcerated parent as well as provide language and guidance to their caregivers. Since its release, the initiative has been making a real impact on the lives of families and children affected by incarceration across […]

Sesame Street’s newest community engagement initiative, Little Children, Big Challenges: Incarceration, was created to comfort and reassure children who have an incarcerated parent as well as provide language and guidance to their caregivers. Since its release, the initiative has been making a real impact on the lives of families and children affected by incarceration across the country. In order to get these materials into the hands of those families that need them most, Sesame Workshop partnered with the Florida Department of Corrections, the third largest corrections system in the United States, to distribute these resources. We recently participated in two events to help distribute incarceration kits to families in Florida: an event produced in partnership with the Florida Department of Corrections at Polk Correctional Facility on July 13th, and an event produced in partnership with Bridges of America at the Orlando Bridge Transition Center on August 10th.

Life-sized versions of our beloved Sesame Street characters came to both events and helped make the day especially memorable for inmates and their families. In order to share just how special these events can be, we asked Ander Pearce, an inmate at the Orlando Bridge Transition Center, to write about the experience he and his family had at the August 10th event with Bridges of America. The Workshop would like to thank Mr. Pearce for taking the time to contribute to our blog.

This event meant a lot to me, my wife, but it especially meant a lot to my children. That’s why I helped prepare for it with determination. We painted the Sesame Street characters, set up the props, games, tables and chairs, and stuffed supplies into the backpacks for all the kids. It felt wonderful to work as a team with the other men in the Transition Center. It was a privilege to work alongside men in the same situation as me. We wanted everything to be just right for our families. It was good for both the children and we the incarcerated parents.

It gave me the opportunity to be with my kids and have a good time. I have visits with my children every weekend, except for times when they skip because traveling south from Ocala is too expensive. But to have a special event like this, that excited my children so much, is something my family needed. My little girl Madisson couldn’t wait to see Elmo. Her face lit up when he came down the street. She wrapped her little arms around Elmo’s leg and squeezed him with the biggest smile I’ve ever seen. And our son Alex loves to draw so when he saw all of the characters and paintings he was so excited. The joy and delight was all over his face. When it was time to line up for backpacks, they couldn’t wait. Even my oldest son Bradley was excited. It was a great day.

When I became incarcerated, we told my kids I had broken the law and was being punished for committing that crime. I gave them an example: If they couldn’t share a toy, then they toy would be taken away as a consequence. That’s what was happening – this was a consequence for an adult crime. The Sesame Street curriculum has also helped them understand what is going on in their lives. The kids can relate to Alex, the main character in a story about a family who has an incarcerated parent. It’s wonderful what Sesame Street is doing for children. It works. We have also reached out to my family to help explain this to our children.

If there is one piece of advice I would give to other men in my situation, it’s don’t give up. There is hope. You can make that change in your life. You can live happy and be free. Remember that your family needs you and loves you no matter what you’ve done in the past, and it can be fixed. Just have faith.

]]>http://www.sesameworkshop.org/our-blog/2013/08/29/there-is-hope-an-inmates-account-of-the-sesame-incarceration-initiative/feed/0Sesame Visits Families at Rikers Islandhttp://www.sesameworkshop.org/our-blog/2013/06/17/sesame-street-visits-families-at-rikers-island/
http://www.sesameworkshop.org/our-blog/2013/06/17/sesame-street-visits-families-at-rikers-island/#commentsMon, 17 Jun 2013 20:24:06 +0000http://www.sesameworkshop.org/our-blog/?p=2788The 2.7 million children in the United States with an incarcerated parent are in a uniquely difficult situation. They feel a number of complex emotions: sadness, shame, guilty, anger. Yet they often don’t feel they are allowed to talk about their experience, partly because the adults in their life oftentimes don’t know how to talk […]

The 2.7 million children in the United States with an incarcerated parent are in a uniquely difficult situation. They feel a number of complex emotions: sadness, shame, guilty, anger. Yet they often don’t feel they are allowed to talk about their experience, partly because the adults in their life oftentimes don’t know how to talk about the experience either. That’s why Sesame Workshop launched Little Children, Big Challenges: Incarceration, a multimedia, bi-lingual (English/Spanish) outreach initiative with stories featuring Sesame Street’s beloved characters that help children feel reassured, loved and supported.

On Saturday, Sesame Street took its message of love and support to Rikers Island, a correctional facility in New York City. Gordon, Rosita and Abby Cadabby performed for inmates and their families, and the kits, which include videos for children and guides for parents to help them navigate this complex topic, were distributed. After the event, Winette Saunders-Halyard, the assistant commissioner for community partnerships and program development at Rikers Island, said having the cast and characters from the show at the facility was fantastic.

“The kids were ecstatic,” she said. “No one can make a child smile the way Sesame Street can.”

She explained that, given the complex ways in which incarceration affects children, it was great to have an organization like Sesame Workshop raising awareness about the issue.

“Sesame Street is expert at dissecting complex issues and making them child friendly,” she said.
The way the Muppets talk to children really makes the children feel comfortable. An adult could say the exact same thing, but a Muppet’s message is so much more powerful.”

“I don’t think people feel comfortable talking about it,” she continued. “These materials will help raise awareness about the impact of incarceration on children and help remove the stigma associated with it.”

To learn more about Sesame Street’s trip to Rikers Island and the ways in which we’re working to help children with an incarcerated parent, watch the above video. To see the material we have created specifically for children affected by incarceration, click here. To see photos from Sesame Street‘s trip to Rikers Island, click here.

]]>http://www.sesameworkshop.org/our-blog/2013/06/17/sesame-street-visits-families-at-rikers-island/feed/0‘They Need to Know They are Loved': Centerforce’s Carol Burton on Sesame Workshop’s Incarceration Initiativehttp://www.sesameworkshop.org/our-blog/2013/06/12/they-need-to-know-they-are-loved-centerforces-carol-burton-on-sesame-workshops-incarceration-initiative/
http://www.sesameworkshop.org/our-blog/2013/06/12/they-need-to-know-they-are-loved-centerforces-carol-burton-on-sesame-workshops-incarceration-initiative/#commentsWed, 12 Jun 2013 17:18:22 +0000http://www.sesameworkshop.org/our-blog/?p=2765The number of children with an incarcerated parent has increased nearly 80% in the past 20 years. Nearly 2.7 million children have a parent in state or federal prison, yet few resources exist to support young children and families coping with this life-changing circumstance. Children need tools to express emotions, while their caregivers need help maintaining routines […]

]]>The number of children with an incarcerated parent has increased nearly 80% in the past 20 years. Nearly 2.7 million children have a parent in state or federal prison, yet few resources exist to support young children and families coping with this life-changing circumstance. Children need tools to express emotions, while their caregivers need help maintaining routines and establishing age-appropriate communication around incarceration. That’s why Sesame Workshop has created Little Children, Big Challenges: Incarceration, a new outreach initiative.

This bilingual, multimedia initiative includes material that can help young children with an incarcerated parent find support, comfort and reduced levels of anxiety and sadness, as well as provides parents and care-givers with strategies, tips, and age-appropriate language they can use to help communicate with their children about incarceration.

The Little Children, Big Challenges initiative, which includes efforts to address the loss of a parent, divorce, incarceration and other difficult situations young children face, grew out of Sesame Workshop’s Military Families initiative.

To learn more about why children with incarcerated parents are in need of support, Sesame Workshop sat down with Carol F. Burton, executive director of Centerforce, a non-profit dedicated to supporting individuals and families impacted by incarceration. Ms. Burton also served as an advisor to Sesame Workshop during the development of the Little Children, Big Challenges: Incarceration initiative.

Sesame Workshop:To start off, tell us about the state of children in the United States with an incarcerated parent today.

Carol Burton:There are several million children impacted by incarceration in this country. They really are the silent victims of the war on crime over the last twenty years. They are the collateral damage. No one is paying attention to them. When someone is incarcerated, institutions are responsible for their custody and care. Children are left back in the community – communities that are often ravaged by drugs, crime and violence. Lots of those kids are left unattended.

That is the real state of care for children with an incarcerated parent. Some are doing pretty well. Others are faring poorly. We don’t even know what’s happening with a significant group of them. They fall under the responsibility of no public institution – none that provide support or care as we remove their parents from their home.

SW: Tell us more about Centerforce and the work it does with people impact by incarceration.

CB: Centerforce is a non-profit working with people who live in prison, their families and the communities that are impacted by incarceration. We started in a house outside of San Quentin State Prison in California. We helped ensure that prisons had visitor centers that provided resources, shelter and materials for loved ones visiting inmates.

Today we serve adults with high risk health behaviors who live in prison, provide support and education to parents in prison and jails, and help with the difficult process of reuniting incarcerated individuals with their families. We also work with youth who are going into the juvenile justice system.

SW: Having a parent removed from your home is undoubtedly a difficult event for a child. What do children struggle with in the wake of having a parent incarcerated?

CB: Guilt. Some of the children feel responsible for having their parents removed and incarcerated. They often say, “If I could have gotten better grades or behaved better, this wouldn’t have happened.” They think it’s something about them. Of course there is sadness and a sense of loss, because they miss and love their parent. There is some shame that is associated with it. The other parents and caregivers around them don’t talk about it, so they learn it’s something to be ashamed of. Shame, guilt, and sadness can all lead to anger as well.

SW: What messages should children be hearing from caregivers or their non-incarcerated parent?

CB: They need to know that they are loved regardless of where their other parent is. If their parent can’t demonstrate that, the other adults around them need to help them feel loved and need to remind them it’s not their fault. Those are the two major things: They need to know they are loved and it’s not their fault. After that, there are some other things that help. For instance, discussing where the other parent is and when he or she is coming home.

SW: How do you feel that an organization like Sesame Workshop is tackling this issue?

CB: When I first heard about it, I was ecstatic. I thought, “Finally someone is paying attention to this.” Of course you know Sesame Street is loved by everyone and does really good work. So for them to be taking this on, my reaction was just pure excitement and joy.

18 months later, I realize that if all the advocates for children of incarcerated parents worked for an entire lifetime to increase awareness, we could not do what Sesame will do with this initiative. It would not reach and impact the audience that Sesame Street will. We have people paying attention to the issue because Sesame Workshop has said, “this is important.” In some ways, we’ve already accomplished what would have taken us 50 years. I’m thrilled.

SW: As the initiative formally gets under way, what message would you like to leave with readers, parents and caregivers?

CB: All of our children need support if they are going to do well and thrive in the world. The Sesame Street incarceration kit gives adults who care for children with an incarcerated parent the tools they need to provide that support. The adults now have the tools in their hands necessary to help their children feel strong, loved, protected and valued.